Family and others carry the casket holding Mary Richardson Kennedy, the estranged wife of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., to a hearse after a service at St. Patrick's Church in Bedford, N.Y., Saturday, May 19, 2012. Kennedy was found dead of an apparent suicide this week at her home in Bedford. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., stands just left of center in background, helping carry the casket. (AP Photo/Craig Ruttle)

WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. -- Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s accusations about his estranged wife's behavior before her suicide amounted to "a brutal psychological weapon," her family says.

In the affidavit, dated September 2011, Robert Kennedy accused Mary Kennedy of abusing his children from an earlier marriage and stealing from them and him.

It asked a judge for an order of protection to keep her from physically attacking him, showing up uninvited at his homes and denigrating him to their children.

Kennedy, son of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy and nephew of President John F. Kennedy, also asked that his wife be required to remain sober in front of their children and not threaten suicide in their presence.

Mary Kennedy hanged herself last month at the family's estate in Bedford. The divorce was pending. One of Mary Kennedy's brothers tried to get custody of her body before she was buried near the Kennedy compound in Massachusetts.

The Richardson family's statement said the affidavit, posted online by The Daily Beast as part of a Newsweek magazine article, "was written by Bobby Kennedy as part of a contentious custody battle and was nothing more than a brutal psychological weapon in the divorce case."

It said the release of the document was proof of the "emotional and psychological abuse that Mary endured during the last years of her life, and also in death."

Patricia Kennedy, President John F. Kennedy's sister, married British actor Peter Lawford in 1954, after having dated him for less than a year. They had four children before they divorced in 1966. They separated after her brother JFK's assassination in November 1963. Lawford reportedly struggled with his wife's steadfast Catholicism and her family's stature, and Kennedy became fed up with Lawford's drinking and extramarital affairs.

Former Massachusets Senator Ted Kennedy married Joan Bennett Kennedy in 1958. They had three children (Kara, Ted Jr., and Patrick) before they divorced in 1982. Scandal plagued the marriage and Kennedy's presidential prospects; In July 1969, he accidentally killed 28-year-old Mary Jo Kopechne, whom he left a party with, when he drove off a bridge on Chippaquiddick Island. Though he denied having inappropriate relations with Kopechne, he and Joan separated in 1977 and divorced in 1981. He remarried Victoria Anne Reggie, a divorced mother of two, in 1992, and remained with her until his death in August 2009.

Politician and businessman Joseph Kennedy II married Sheila Brewster Rauch in 1979. They had twin sons, Matthew and Joseph Patrick II, before they divorced in 1991. Two years later, Kennedy asked the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston for an annulment of the marriage, which would allow him to remarry in a Roman Catholic ceremony and participate in other sacraments of the church. Rauch refused to agree to the annulment, and Kennedy remarried Anne Elizabeth "Beth" Elizabeth in a non-Catholic ceremony in 1993. The Boston Archdiocese eventually granted the annulment, prompting Rauch to write a book, "Shattered Faith: A Woman's Struggle to Stop the Catholic Church from Annulling Her Marriage", about why she was opposed to it. She appealed to the Vatican and the annulment was overturned in 2007.

Courtney Kennedy, the daughter of Robert F. Kennedy and Ethel Skakel Kennedy, married TV executive Jeffrey Ruhe in 1980; they divorced in 1990. Three years later, she married Paul Michael Hill (above), an Irishman who was wrongly convicted of and imprisoned for two Irish Republic Army (IRA) bombings in London. They had one child, Saoirse Roisin Hill, before they separated in February 2006.

Michael Kennedy, Courtney Kennedy's brother, married Victoria Gifford in in 1981. They had three children, and lived in Massachusets where Kennedy helped organize his uncle Ted Kennedy's re-election campaign against Mitt Romney in 1994. Scandal broke in 1997, when it was revealed that Michael Kennedy was having a five-year affair with the family's former babysitter--the 19-year-old daughter of a close family friend. Shortly after the news was publicized, Kennedy and his wife separated. He was killed in a ski accident in December 1997.

Attorney Robert Kennedy Jr. married Elizabeth Ruth Black in 1982; they had two children (Robert Kennedy III and Kathleen Kennedy) before they divorced in March 1994. Three weeks after his divorce was finalized, he married Mary Richardson, with whom he had four children: John Conor Richardson Kennedy, Kyra LeMoyne , William Finbar, and Aidan Coahman Vieques. Kennedy filed for divorce in July 2010, three days before Mary was charged with drunken driving.

Human rights activist Mary Kerry Kennedy married Andrew Cuomo, the current governor of New York, in 1991. They had three daughters (Cara Ethel Kennedy Cuomo, Mariah Matilda Kennedy Cuomo, and Michaela Andrea Kennedy Cuomo) before they divorced 2005 amidst rumors of Kennedy's infidelity. Kennedy was reportedly having an affair with restaurateur Bruce Colley, a friend of the Cuomos. After releasing a joint statement announcing the end to their 13-year-marriage, Cuomo's lawyer released another statement saying he was "betrayed and saddened by his wife's conduct."